Improving mod_perl Sites' Performance

"It's desirable to avoid forking under mod_perl, as when you do, you are forking the entire Apache server -- lock, stock and barrel. Not only is your Perl code and Perl interpreter being duplicated, but so is mod_ssl, mod_rewrite, mod_log, mod_proxy, mod_speling (it's not a typo!) or whatever modules you have used in your server, all the core routines."